I, too, have been in Ravenna.

It is a little dead city

That has churches and a good many ruins.

You can read about it in books.

You walk back through it and look around you:

The streets are so muddy and damp, and so

Dumbstruck for a thousand years,

And moss and grass, everywhere.

That is what old songs are like—

You listen to them, and nobody laughs

And everybody draws back into

His own time till night falls into him.

The women of Ravenna,

With their deep gazes and affectionate gestures,

Carry a knowledge of the days

Of the old city, their festivals.

The women of Ravenna

Weep like children who won’t tell you: deep, light.

And when they laugh, a glittering song

Rises in the sludge of the text.

The women of Ravenna pray

Like children: gentle, fully contented.

They can speak love’s words without even knowing

Themselves they are lying.

The women of Ravenna kiss

Rarely and deep, they kiss back.

And all they know about life is that

We all have to die.